Conflict and climate push 224 million Africans into hunger - U.N.

Zeinab's sister Habiba, 29, sits with her children beside their shelter at a camp for internally displaced people from drought hit areas in Dollow, Somalia April 2, 2017. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra

ROME (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The number of hungry people in sub-Saharan Africa rose by 10 percent to 224 million in 2016, largely due to conflict and climate change, the United Nations said on Thursday.

Swathes of Africa have been hit by prolonged droughts and floods over the last year, worsened by lower commodity prices and a sluggish global economy, the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization said.

Hunger is about twice as prevalent in countries with long-running conflicts than in peaceful nations, it said.

Famine struck in parts of South Sudan in 2017 while warnings were sounded in Nigeria and Somalia.

Africa is highly vulnerable to climate change due to its poverty and reliance on rain-fed agriculture, experts say.

Global hunger levels rose in 2016 for the first time in more than a decade to 815 million people or 11 percent of the world’s population.